


The Miller-McKay Bridge

by igrab



Series: Relativity [4]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Alternate Universe - Mensa, Episode: s03e08 McKay and Mrs. Miller, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-17
Updated: 2014-11-17
Packaged: 2018-02-25 19:40:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2633825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrab/pseuds/igrab
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first thing that makes Ronnie double take, every time, is that Merrie wears <i>makeup</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Miller-McKay Bridge

**Author's Note:**

> so i have at least one more story before this in the chronology - I'm still sort of loitering at the end of season 2, but i got curious about the mensa!verse and ended up watching the relevant episode. whoops! anyway, have some lesbians.

"Now, I presume you go by...?"

"Uhh. Ronnie?"

"Huh." The woman wearing Ronnie's face smiles, openly, heartwarmingly. "I'm Merrie."

Å

The first thing that makes Ronnie double take, every time, is that Merrie wears _makeup_. It isn't even tasteless, either - just, you know, that kind of makeup that girls wore that made them look like they weren't wearing any at all, the kind that Ronnie had always been secretly jealous of but never enough to try. Merrie is... actually, kind of pretty. She has on a nice bra, something that supports her figure, she has a trim leather jacket and close-fitting pants and she walks like she's hot and knows it. It's infuriating.

Jeannie, for her part, doesn't seem to know quite what to do with this sexy, feminine, _caring_ version of her estranged big sister, but Ronnie knows with a sinking heart that it won't take long for her to realize that this version is the better one. How can she not? They're standing there in the containment room and Ronnie was literally snapping at Jeannie over a _button_ , for chrissakes. Could she _be_ any more juvenile and petulant? Apparently, yes. Apparently, that's all Ronnie's good for.

She comes down for breakfast after a long night trying to think of possible methods of scanning for particular parallel universes, already cross because nights away from Jo make her pissy - only to find that this, too, has been usurped. Merrie's there, laughing at something Jo said, and Ronnie _knows_ it's something Jo said because there's that dumb little crinkle in the corner of her eyes that Ronnie recognizes from the damn mirror, because Jo's the only one who makes her laugh like that.

But she gets closer, and no, apparently Merrie just smiles like that, with her whole face, all the time.

"Ron," Jo says, her eyes lighting up but a low smirk still sprawled on her stupid face. "Missed you last night, baby."

Ugh. Ronnie rolls her eyes, but obligingly leans over and plants a quick kiss on Jo's lips. "Whatever."

And because Jo hates her, probably, she continues - "Had to get Meredith to keep me company," and _winks_.

Ronnie gives her a short, furious look that hopefully communicates _aren't you tired of making me jealous yet?_ But Jo just smirks, because she isn't, ever. Asshole. And that would be the end of it, but.

This is different, she realizes, as she sits off to the side and lets the chatter of happy women wash over and around her, none of it registering. Because Merrie's really _her_ , or rather, she's the woman Ronnie always wanted to be but never could, and there is literally nothing that she can come up with that would make Jo want the original more. Her only redeeming qualities are her brain and, probably, her tits, and Merrie wears both of those better than Ron ever did.

After discovering that, hey, things could always get worse (welcome to the Pegasus galaxy), Merrie goes to _spar_ with _Ronoa_ , which is just so bizarre and awful that Ronnie immediately absconds to the safety of her and Jo's room.

Jo finds her there, naked under the blankets, poking listlessly at a datapad and trying to think of how to fix the problem, but nothing. She's got nothing. Absolutely fucking _nothing_.

"Hey," Jo says from the doorway, and Ronnie doesn't even look up, she just. Ugh. _Ugh_.

Because Johanna Sheppard is an actual saint or something, she doesn't say anything, just goes over, shrugs out of her jacket and boots and sprawls on the bed next to her. The silence isn't uncomfortable, and finally Ronnie sighs, explosive, before tossing the pad onto the laundry pile and rolling over to face her.

Jo's just watching, her eyes bright and clear and that beautiful, familiar hazel-green.

"She's slowing me down," Ronnie snaps, but Jo rolls her eyes.

"No, you're jealous. What's up with that, anyway?" She lifts a hand, palms the flat plane of Ronnie's cheek and the stubborn line of her jaw. "I was just teasing. You're _my_ McKay, you know. That's what matters."

"I know," Ronnie says automatically, but something's still making her stomach twist. "I know that. I do. I think I do." She frowns, tipping her head into Jo's hand. 

"Are you worried that Jeannie likes her better?"

No! she wants to say, but that's a lie, isn't it? And she knows that. "Maybe." But what's eating at her - the _big_ thing, the part that _hurts_ \- she swallows, closes her eyes. Tries to be brave enough to actually do the relationship thing and just _say_ it. "It's more that - I don't. I don't know why anyone wouldn't." Oh fuck, no, she can feel tears in the corners of her eyes and that's all kinds of not okay. "She's like. Better than me. In every way. It would be stupid for Jeannie not to like her better. It's stupid for _you_ not to like her better. Why don't you, anyway??" Unless you do, she thinks, frantically trying not to but unable to stop herself. Unless you do and you're not telling me and it'll seem natural when you leave me for her but I'll know, I'll know it's because I wasn't good enough - 

Jo snorts a bit, shrugging one shoulder. "Honestly? She's nice and everything, but I'm not all that attracted to her. Like, I guess we could be friends, but." And those eyes, those gorgeous eyes are all 100% for Ronnie. "She doesn't make me look twice, let alone over and over and over again."

Ronnie feels herself blush deep, deep from the bottom of her soul, and she ducks her head, pressing their lips together in something altogether more heartwarming than usual. But, she figures she's allowed. Definitely allowed. Definitely - 

"Dr. McKay to the containment chamber. Dr. McKay to the containment chamber."

Å

"Look, what you have here - with the Colonel," and suddenly Ronnie feels a weird lurch in her stomach, she knows where this is going - _mine's better, I've got to get home, I've got to go be with her_ \- but that, as it turns out, isn't what she says.

"It's special," Merrie says, quiet and sincere. "My Sheppard - I don't even get to call her Johanna, not really. It's always Colonel, always... she's. Strict. Straitlaced."

"Does she give a damn about DADT?" Ronnie butts in, because despite hearing a little bit on the subject before, she'd kind of written it off, honestly. 

Merrie's smile is the sad and self-deprecating one, and it just looks so awful on her pretty face. " _Shit_ yeah. I don't even - I don't think. I mean, I wouldn't have thought for a moment that she was gay, if I hadn't met your Jo." Merrie bites her lip and hangs her head and Ronnie - fuck everything, Ronnie feels _sorry_ for her.

"Then don't go," she says, not quite believing herself, that the words are actually coming out of her mouth. "Stay."

Merrie sighs and shakes her head, smiling again, all rueful and soft and, goddamnit, _fond_. "I can't."

"Everyone loves you here."

"Yeah, but it's not home."

Ronnie stares, gobsmacked, at this alternate-universe-her who smiles and laughs and knows how to be a human being, let alone a girl. She's just - she doesn't know what to say.

"I've learned so much from you," she says, earnestly, and before Ronnie can stop it she's _hugging_ her, their chests making things totally unwieldy by being enormous and existing at exactly the same height and they both laugh, soft and honest, with the exact same rhythm. "You're incredible, you know that? The way you can just... be yourself, and say what you mean - god, that must be so _freeing_."

Ronnie had never thought about it like that.

"So, yeah," Merrie continues. "Enjoy your life, Ron."

Ronnie lets Jeannie push the button, this time. It's just a button, and it doesn't matter, but she can see it in her face, now, that sometimes, it does.

Å

She's waiting, poised, because she knows she's only going to have one tiny fraction of a second to catch this.

The second - no, the _instant_ she lands on the other side of the rift - she looks for Colonel Johanna Sheppard.

Johanna keeps her hair cut short, because she doesn't believe girls should be given any military concessions. She doesn't wear makeup, frowns down on the marines that do, but her uniforms are always meticulously pressed and fit her with unerring precision. She's a pain in the ass, for the most part, but she doesn't settle for less than the best, and it's the reason she tolerates Merrie - the only reason, she'd thought. Until now.

Because when she arrives, back from what should rightfully have been a one-way suicide mission - for a split-hair fraction of a second, Meredith can see a look of panicked, desperate happiness, of _relief_ , before her mask is firmly back in place.

She grins and tosses her hair back and goes off to ream Zelenka a new asshole. Seducing the Colonel is going to be _fun_.


End file.
